I Defy You, Stars
by Annie Lockwood
Summary: "Never was there a story of more woe than this of Juliet and her Romeo." A dark spin on what Ginny experiences during her first year at Hogwarts with Tom Riddle's diary and her twisted relationship with the Dark Lord.
1. I

**_I Defy You, Stars_**

* * *

 **Disclaimer:** I own absolutely nothing from the Harry Potter universe. This fanfiction is written purely for entertainment purposes and nothing more, though all ideas and writing are done by me and belong to me.

 **A/N:** Well, I am quite irritated with this site. Once again, it has cut me off around the 6,600 word marker and won't let me continue saving further from that point. So once again I am forced to condense my chapters into several different parts. Remember the days when I could easily punch out like 12,000 word chapters? Yeah, it's not happening anymore for some reason.

Anyway, rant over.

I've recently had this conversation with a close friend of mine about the relationship between Ginny and Tom Riddle/Voldemort, especially regarding her experience with the cursed diary, and how it could potentially be incredibly terrifying and dark. After all, the Dark Lord preys on a young girl on the cusp of adolescence.

I rarely see good Ginny/Tom fics that discuss the type of horror I'm certain Ginny faced while in possession of Voldemort's horcrux. I feel like no one likes to _go there_ because it's just kind of _messed up_. I mean, she carried this thing around with her almost all year. Do you remember how long Harry and Hermione and Ron lasted carrying Slytherin's locket around their neck before they went batshit crazy in DH?

I've just got to give a round of applause to our dear Ginny. I have a newfound respect for her.

And I find the aspect of Ginny/Tom both captivating and horrific, kind of like a car crash that you slow down on the freeway to inspect because we as a people are _morbid._

So, here's my attempt at a visceral, dark, very horcrux-ey twist on what Ginny might have experienced.

P.S. - Every quote excerpt in this fan fiction is taken from Shakespeare's _Romeo & Juliet_.

P.P.S. - I will be writing a companion piece to this about what Ginny experiences in the aftermath of the diary, how it shapes her into the person she grows into during the HP series, and what she deals with behind the scenes.

P.P.P.S - This is serious crack. Like I've never written Ginny/Tom. Up until recently, I've really never even enjoyed Ginny. That being said, I've been itching to write something like this for ages and never had the courage to and well, here we are.

Should I shut up now?

Enjoy!

—Annie

* * *

 _Part I_

* * *

 ** _Give me my Romeo; and, when he shall die,_**  
 ** _Take him and cut him out in little stars,  
_** ** _And he will make the face of heaven so fine_**  
 ** _That all the world will be in love with night_**  
 ** _And pay no worship to the garish sun._**

 **—William Shakespeare**

* * *

 _In fair Verona, where we lay our scene_

* * *

Ginny turns eleven.

She's carefree and spirited around her brothers, annoys her mother with prying questions about body changes and when her lumpy, barely A-cup breasts will grow to look like her mother's, and wonders loudly to her father why Ron's voice has dropped two full octaves and squeaks when he's embarrassed.

She demolishes Percy in three swift moves of Wizards chess, isn't ashamed by the spiral of glee that flits through her when Percy sits back, folds his arms, and smiles proudly at her, defeated.

Her hair is short and curls inward around her round, cherub baby face no matter how many times she brushes it and her lips are somehow always chapped. Her sun-kissed skin is speckled and gold and scraped and her cheeks are ruddy from exertion from artfully dodging Fred and George's homemade, bewitched bludgers on their makeshift Quidditch pitch outside.

"Young lady, you are not a wild beast," tuts her mother disapprovingly from her stance near the open kitchen window, soapy and prune covered hands on her hips. "Wash the dirt from your hands, wipe the blood from your knees, and for goodness sake, dear, do something with your hair!"

She wallops Ginny on the bottom as she passes her mother with mud-stained sneakers.

Molly had hoped for a daughter, was the happiest she'd ever been when Ginny was born, had decked her room in pink frill and bought her an army of porcelain dolls with cornsilk hair and painted smiles. She didn't expect Ginny to turn out just like her brother's, with a quick wit and a hearty laugh and an energy of a dangerous scale hurricane. She didn't expect Ginny to cut her doll's hair and glue it to Percy's chin like a makeshift beard or to color over her pale rose walls with vibrant royal blue marker.

But even at a young age, Ginny is a force of nature.

She can't control the trembling she feels in her bones when Harry Potter arrives at their home, attempts to ignore the walloping pitter-patter of her heart inside her chest, tries not to squeak too much when his bold green eyes drift over her, doesn't process Ron's newfound friendship very well.

She feels replaced as she enters Hogwarts and leaves all she knows behind, barely noticed. She's just another Weasley in thrift store quality robes, just another red-haired freckle face at the Gryffindor table, just a little girl too annoying and too young to hang round the brother that was once her best friend before he left for Hogwarts and abandoned her at home with their nitpicky mother. She's too giggly and too sisterly to be noticed by Harry and too unladylike and insecure to be bothered with by Hermione.

She could stand on top of the table in the Great Hall with her hands waving madly in circles through the air, screaming at the top of her lungs, and is certain no one will even bother to glance her way.

Ginerva Molly Weasley, aged eleven, does not take well to being lonely.

So, when her diary begins writing her messages in scribbled black ink, Ginny doesn't hesitate very long before responding.

* * *

 _O teach me how I should forget to think_

* * *

Ginny hesitates initially.

 _I'm not one to usually keep a diary, not usually one to lock away my thoughts,_ she writes, _but Dad bought this for me, wanted me to put it to good use, and I need something to occupy myself with. I think he realized how hard the transition into Hogwarts would be for me._

The journal is small in size and the aged black leather cover is soft against her fingertips. She sighs from where she's positioned on her stomach in the grass near the lake and rolls her eyes, closes the diary's pages, shoves it deep into her book sack.

She ignores it for a good two days, thinks herself too mature now to dilly dally in such a girlish thing as a _diary_ , and she's doing just _fine_ , adjusting well to her classes and she's not too overwhelmed by her coursework, and the bubbly blonde Lavender Brown let Ginny borrow her lipgloss last Monday.

And Ginny is _adapting._

Until—

"No, I will not help you with your Potions essay. It's not my fault you've stalled until the last moment. I've got enough to worry about, haven't I?"

"Ron, you're being very rude," points out Hermione, smiling kindly at Ginny in a pitifully sympathetic way that makes Ginny shift from one foot to the other.

"Will _you_ help me?" Ginny asks Hermione.

The bushy haired brunette sighs heavily from her armchair. "Oh, I'm so sorry. I really would, but I've already agreed to help Harry with his History of Magic assignment."

Ginny scuffs her laced up oxford along the crimson carpet runner.

"Ron, please? If Mum finds out—"

"Shove _off_ , Ginny," Ron grates. "Merlin, you are so _annoying_ lately."

The dormitory is empty and the air is stale and Ginny sniffs loudly into her pillow.

The diary blinks at her, waiting.

The binding of its spine is crisp and virgin, and the pages are naked and aching to be caressed from its spot on her bedside table. It makes a crumpled whining noise as she opens it.

She attempts to find her handwriting from where she previously left off and draws up a blank, brow furrowed.

Her words are gone and in their place are new, unfamiliar ones, scrawled out in elegantly slanted cursive.

What is your name?

She hesitates, only briefly, and then—

 _Ginny._

She eyes the page in astounded and suspicious awe, as her name bleeds into the parchment and begins to dissipate, fading to gray and then disappearing altogether.

Pleasure to meet you, Ginny. My name is Tom.

She gasps, snaps the journal shut.

You see, she hesitates initially.

* * *

 _I saw the wound, I saw it with mine eyes_

* * *

She contemplates tracking Hermione Granger down in the library.

Debates on whether or not to address a teacher.

Maybe write to her mother and father.

But she doesn't, and the diary continues to beckon her.

 _Tom Marvolo Riddle_ is printed in single block gold leaf across the bottom right corner.

It seems to be pulsing with life, seems to whisper sweet saccharine nothings in her ear.

 _Tom? As in Tom Marvolo Riddle, the owner of the diary?_

The diary shifts, moans, _breathes_.

Yes.

 _How are you talking to me?_

I'm in a very peculiar situation, Ginny. You see, I'm stuck inside this diary.

 _Stuck? How did you end up in there?_

I don't really recall. One moment I was out there, in the real world, with people like you. The next, I'm trapped inside my journal.

 _Has anyone attempted getting you out?_

You are the first to come by my diary, Ginny. I have been lonely for quite some time.

The pages hiss, crackle, _sigh_.

* * *

 _A thousand times goodnight_

* * *

 ** _Tom Riddle is easy to talk to._**

He responds to her with clear, sharp movements, within seconds of her handwriting disappearing. He handles her questions with charm and ease, uses a witty, intelligent sort of humor, and remembers every detail of what she shares with him.

 ** _Tom Riddle is easy to open up to._**

He consoles her when her tears soak into the page, seep deep into the diary's marrow. He calms her anger filled rants over her brother and allows her excitable, frivolous tangents over Harry Potter, and soothes her troubles. He advises her on ways to perfect her mixture in Potions and ace her Transfiguration essay.

 ** _Tom Riddle is easy to trust._**

She opens up to him about her insecurities, about her fears, her hopes and her dreams.

Her nightmares.

 ** _Tom Riddle is easy to lean on._**

The diary has become her crutch, the place she turns to when she needs a hand to hold or a sage piece of advice.

Fred is starting to wonder where Ginny runs off to, George questions what she is up to, and Percy worries she is keeping too much to herself.

Ron continues not to notice, and with him, Harry remains dubious to her attention, to her affection.

 ** _Tom Riddle is easy to befriend_.**

He becomes her confidant, the only one that truly understands her. He's kind and witty and brave and cunning. He's smart and helpful and watchful and protective.

 _Do you have a full name, like Thomas?_

Just Tom. How about yourself?

 _My given name is Ginerva. I hate it. Only my mother ever calls me it, and only when she's scolding me._

He is wise beyond his years.

I quite like it. It's a good name—strong, sophisticated, _pretty_. Just like you.

He is flattering beyond measure.

Goodnight, sweet Ginerva.

Her full name no longer seems to bother her after that.

 ** _Tom Riddle is easy to become infatuated with._**

She begins to crave his attention, pines for his affection, lusts after his compliments and approval.

He is older—sixteen—smarter, braver...mysterious.

She is captivated by him, adores him.

 ** _Tom Riddle is easy to fall victim to._**

* * *

 _What storm is this that blows so contrary?_

* * *

Outside, a fierce thunderstorm barrels against the castle, weeping and groaning in the floorboards and through the drafts in the stonework and hissing through the panels of the ceiling.

Ginny fumbles to her dormitory with a piercing migraine, her throat dry and lips cracked despite the abundance of pumpkin juice she'd downed at dinner.

 _Drip. Drip. Drip._

There is a leak from the far side of the silent dormitory. The rusty orange-tinged water plops into the tin bucket, similar to the rhythm of Ginny's heartbeat. It reverberates around the cold, damp room, jostling stuck inside of Ginny's brain like a mantra.

 _Drip. Drip. Drip._

Ginny is unreasonably agitated, blames it on her headache, lights a crackling fire behind the cast iron fence barrier. The fireplace hisses and sparks to life, welcomed warmth barreling out like velvet hands upon her frigid skin.

She feels peckish, irritable, lightheaded.

You must rest, Ginerva, Tom insists. Close your eyes and darken your thoughts, numb everything else out, don't focus on your surroundings.

With a lofty sigh, Ginny strokes Tom's scrawl like some lovelorn mistress and places her diary in the folds of her bedside table, tucked away and hidden underneath her ripped and yellowing edition of _Standard Book Of Spells: Grade 1_.

Following Tom's advice, Ginny allows her eyes to drift closed, leaves her thoughts behind, and forgets herself.

* * *

 _Where two raging fires meet together, they do consume the thing that feeds their fury_

* * *

She dreams of death.

The _drip, drip, drip_ of faulty plumbing.

Mangled moans.

A pitiful, mournful cry of a ghost.

 _Hiss, hiss, hisssss_.

Her hands quake, the world a capsized blur, shifting and groaning and creaking.

Squeaky pipes.

 _Come closer._

She dreams of blood.

 _Closer._

Her heart is a pinprick, tight and coarse and _lucid_.

 _Free...I am free..._

 _At last._

She dreams of Eve in the garden.

 _Kill_ —must _kill_.

Sweat pools at her neck.

Well done, Ginerva.

* * *

 _Pale, pale as ashes, all bedaub'd in blood, all in gore-blood_

* * *

October brings a cruel wind and an abundance of rain. The sun seems permanently hidden behind the claustrophobic cusps of black, rolling storm clouds.

"Looking a bit peaky," mentions George, pressing his hand to her forehead.

"Doing okay, little one?" Fred asks, shaking her shoulder when she remains silent. "You've hardly eaten your dinner."

"Mmm, just fine, thanks," she murmurs quietly, pushes around her peas. "Tired."

"Such a studious, thoughtful young thing," Percy comments proudly. "Always scribbling away in that notebook of hers wherever she goes."

"Heard you even perfected Snape's latest potion concoction," agrees Fred warmly.

"Who knew?" George jokes, comically ratting Ginny's blood orange hair. "Careful or you'll turn into Percy."

Ginny simpers, dry mouthed and bland-faced.

* * *

 _O serpent heart, hid with a flowering face!_

* * *

Gradually, Ginny's body begins to develop.

Puberty slams into her like a freight train, barreling through her veins, skyrocketing up her bone marrow, changing and shaping and _tearing_.

Her shins ache every night with what Madam Promfrey assures her is growing pains, her hips begin to jut out, her hair grows in thicker and lush, and she's burdened with a flourish of blemishes that seem to pop up overnight.

Lavender Brown makes fun of her blossoming breasts and her acne and Ginny skips Transfiguration to cry in a stall in an abandoned girls lavatory rumored to be haunted by the ghost of a girl that died there years before.

She inspects her body with accusing, loathing eyes that rake over her budding form and spit blisters on her consciousness. She's ugly, repugnant, foul, _awkward_.

 _Stupid, silly, little girl_ , a sibilant voice hisses in the forest of cobwebs in her brain. _Disgusting runt, pitiful babyface, ugly duckling._

She writes to her mother in tears and Molly assures her that there's nothing to be concerned about, that she is becoming a woman and is an _early bloomer_ and the other girls will catch up with her soon enough.

It is Tom that teaches her the Bat-Bogey Hex that she uses vindictively under her breath on Lavender Brown that evening. It is Tom that mentions a special face cleansing product at Hogsmeade to help with her acne. It is Tom that helps her learn to appreciate the new forming curves of her changing body.

 _Sweet Ginerva, lovely Ginerva, pretty Ginerva,_ whispers an ethereal murmur. My _Ginverva. Mine. Mine. Mine._

It cocoons her, wraps her in silk arms, purrs in her ear.

Slowly, Ginny transitions into someone else, someone she's starting not to recognize.

Her concentration begins to slip during lectures and she starts bringing her diary to class, occupying her attention with the velvet of Tom Riddle's caressing scribe.

Ginny drifts like a shade, like a specter, through the corridors.

* * *

Then, dreadful trumpet, sound the general doom!

* * *

The nightmares begin halfway through October.

They come in constant, sharp images, terrifying and visceral at one moment and deafening, silenced blackness the next.

Pits of hissing black scaled asps latching onto her naked flesh and pumping their sticky slick and fire hot venom deep into her veins.

Wounded howls of a choking, decaying barn cat that bears an eerie similarity to Mrs. Norris.

Ghoulish faces at the window, sneering and red-eyed and baring sharp razor teeth, raking nail-like fingers against the grimy window at her bedside.

And blood.

Always _blood_.

Flowing and pulsing and black and fresh and metallic on her tongue.

Shut off your mind for me, Ginerva, Tom coos. Sleep with my diary tonight and empty your thoughts. I will keep the nightmares at bay.

Ginny holds the leather bound journal close to her heart, like a safety blanket.

Like a _tourniquet_.

* * *

 _End of Part I_


	2. II

**_I Defy You, Stars_**

* * *

 **Disclaimer:** I own absolutely nothing from the Harry Potter universe. This fanfiction is written purely for entertainment purposes and nothing more, though all ideas and writing are done by me and belong to me.

 **A/N:** This is starting to get more dark so hold onto your butts!

Enjoy!

—Annie

* * *

 _Part II_

* * *

 **Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,**  
 **Who is already sick and pale with grief**  
 **That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she. . . .**  
 **The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars**  
 **As daylight doth a lamp; her eye in heaven**  
 **Would through the airy region stream so bright**  
 **That birds would sing and think it were not night.**

 **—William Shakespeare**

* * *

 _What have I done but murdered my tomorrow?_

* * *

The nightmares stop with a sickly halt and Ginny trembles each night as she settles in for bed, clutches Tom Riddle's diary to her bosom.

It coos and exhales and soothes.

I don't know what I would do without you, Tom, she writes despondently.

And I you, sweet one.

Something stirs warm in her belly.

 _I wish you were real_ , she sighs onto the parchment.

I am real, so long as you bear me piece of mind, is his quick-witted reply. I will always be yours, Ginerva. Always.

 _I just wish I could meet you in person. Talking to a diary gets old sometimes._

Do you grow tired of me so soon?

 _Never, Tom. You know this._

Are you not grateful for what we have?

 _Of course I am._

I am not certain you speak the truth. Your words shake with doubt.

Ginny swallows coarsely.

 _Tom_ —

You grow selfish, Ginerva. I am disappointed in your behavior.

 _Tom, I swear, I'm not_ —

You will be punished for this.

 _Punished? What do you mean by that, Tom?_

 _Tom?_

 _Tom, are you there?_

 _You're scaring me._

The candle seated on her bedside table is snuffed out by the lurch of a sudden, drafty wind.

You shall learn your place.

Ginny inhales sharply, glances hurriedly around the dark dormitory, yanks her crimson curtains closed around her.

* * *

 _Oh, that I were a glove upon that hand. That I might touch that cheek_

* * *

The nightmares return with a vengeful snarl and Ginny wakes in the dead of night, grasping her throat and sputtering for air, as if she's been choked by steel metal hands.

Sweat slips over her collarbone, nestles between her small, budding breasts.

She cries, hot and wild and silent, into the burgundy silk of her pillowcase.

As a defense mechanism, Ginny reaches for the diary, finds it resting in isolation at the foot of her bed.

Her hand shakes as she writes.

 _Tom?_

Silence.

 _Tom, please respond to me._

Nothing.

 _The nightmares have returned, Tom. I'm really frightened._

Her tears dribble from the perch of her freckled nose and onto the dusty, crisp parchment.

 _Stop ignoring me! I know you are there._

Her throat remains dry and sore as she swallows down the bitter taste of rejection. He has abandoned her, all because of her selfish actions and wanting more from him than she has earned.

 _I'm sorry, Tom. Please forgive me._

She doesn't like apologizing.

She doesn't like being ignored.

She is alone.

She is empty.

* * *

 _He jests at scars that never felt a wound_

* * *

It is the week before Halloween and Ginny wakes grumpily to harsh scatters of sunlight pulsing in through her bedside window.

How long has it been since she's seen the sunlight?

Ginny fastens her cloak around her jeans and mustard yellow pullover. She draws her hair into a messy topknot, pushed back with a wide gray cotton headband, and pockets her wand.

The October breeze is cool on her face, the sun a warm contrast on the back of her neck.

Her feet pull her, trancelike, through the castle grounds until she finds herself by Hagrid's hut. The joyful half-giant is humming a jolly tune inside his small, wide house, clanging around teapots and muttering to himself as he collides hard with his dining table.

Ginny admires his pumpkins—wide and stocky and equally the height of her entire form.

 _Cluck, cluck, cluck._

Ginny's eyes drift over to Hagrid's chicken pen. There are at least three roosters and a cluster of annoyingly high pitched, squawking chickens. They holler at her, screech and yell and bleat, snarling and snapping their beaks at her through the fence.

Their eyes are accusing and red and beady and _evil_.

She scampers back to the castle, determined not to leave it again.

* * *

 _If love be blind, it best agrees with night_

* * *

 _Tom, I fear I am going mad without you_ , she insists later that week.

 _Just the other day I went out to Hagrid's hut and there was this cluster of chickens and roosters._

 _I could have sworn they were glaring straight at me, threatening me._

Ginny stares wide-eyed around the library from her corner desk near the Restricted Section.

 _TOM._

 _Please._

Ginny buries her face in her hands, chokes on a sob.

 _I'm lost here, in the dark._

 _Nothing has meaning._

 _Why are you so angry with me? Tell me, what have I done to drive you away like this?_

 _Is this really because I wanted to see you?_

Desperate, Ginny clutches her quill tightly between her slim, shaking fingers.

 _I agree I'm selfish. I know I'm ungrateful._

 _But I can't do this. I think I'm driving myself insane._

 _The nightmares won't go away. I sleep with your journal every night and they still come. They won't leave me._

 _Were you just a part of my imagination? A foolish dream I concocted out of my loneliness?_

She rants and rails, scratches wildly at the diary, clenches her fingers until they scream out in pain.

 _Tom, I need you._

 _I'll do_ anything.

Hush now, sweet one. I am here.

Ginny draws in a surprised, grateful gasp, sheds tears in her relief.

 _Tom, is that really you?_

Indeed, it is. Have you learned your lesson?

 _Yes, yes. Please don't leave me again._

I never left you, child. Didn't I promise you that you would never be without me?

Ginny feels slightly unsettled, senses heightened.

I was cruel to you before, Tom admits. I want to meet you too, Ginerva. To see your pretty face and run my fingers through your hair, kiss your tears away. 

Ginny swallows, clutching the top button of her blouse, and smiles softly.

 _Do you mean it, Tom? Truly?_

I would never lie to you, darling.

 _But you were so angry with me for wanting to see you._

I have a temper, Ginerva. It's blackening and powerful and I forget who I am while in its grasp. It gets the best of me at times.

 _I get that way, too._

Even so, it was wrong for me to express my frustrations in that way to you. I have wanted so badly to be released from this diary for so long, sweet girl, and reading that you wished it also, that I couldn't give that to you, made me upset.

 _I only need you like this, Tom. I'll only ever need you like this._

 _You're everything I have._

You are such a sweet girl, my dear. It pleases me that you are so loyal to our relationship.

Ginny's stomach flips excitedly, unexpectedly at the word _relationship._

But I fear one day I shall not be enough for you, that you will tire of me. Eventually, you are going to need a man in a different way as you grow older, sweet princess, and he will give you what I cannot.

 _Oh, Tom. That's not true!_

And Ginny strongly believes it.

What of Harry Potter? You were so infatuated with him when we first met.

 _Harry doesn't know I exist. On the occasional note that he does, he thinks of me as only a sister._

Foolish, simple-minded boy, Tom expresses darkly. If I had you, I would never let you go.

This makes Ginny quiver.

I've a plan in store, Tom tells her and his handwriting is uneven, rushed. You said you would do anything for me, Ginerva. Do you still mean that?

Ginny sucks in a breath.

 _Yes._

Then you will see me soon, Ginerva. But I must go now.

 _So soon?_

Ginny frowns deeply.

Patience, princess. I've work to attend to.

"Oh, Ginny," Hermione gasps, hand snapping to her heart. "I didn't see you there."

Ginny snaps the leather journal closed in haste, ducks it into her school bag.

"I was just leaving," Ginny says and scurries out of the library, school bag clutched protectively to her chest.

* * *

 _O, then, I see Queen Mab hath been with you_

* * *

Ginny begins experiencing black outs.

Lapses in time.

There are just pigments of her memory that are just not there.

She has no explanation for it.

There's been the sleepwalking, too.

Twice already this week, Hermione has found Ginny climbing from bed, eyes glazed over, head cocked to the side, one hand at her side, the other with her wand outstretched in front of her.

 _I've started blacking out, Tom. There's chunks of the day that I can't remember._

It's the insomnia, Tom concludes. You prevented yourself from sleep when you were plagued by the nightmares in my absence. Your body is reacting to it.

And Ginny believes him.

She really, truly does.

* * *

A greater power than we can contradict has thwarted our intents

* * *

Halloween.

Ginny wakes in a cold sweat in her dormitory.

Disoriented, she blinks about her room.

She doesn't remember coming up here.

Her last memory was her History of Magic lesson at the end of the day.

It was late, too, and the beds were empty. The sky was dark and the clock on the wall chimed that it was dinner.

She was missing the Halloween feast.

Pushing back the thick curtains of her four poster, she notices something is not right.

Painted dark and stained on her skin—

 _Blood._

Actual, real blood.

Still fresh in some areas, dried and flaking on others, embedded under her fingernails.

Smeared across her cheeks, tinged on her teeth, dripping from her clothes.

"Oh my God," she chokes out. "Oh my _God_ _!_ "

Panic ruptures in her veins, fast and pumping and urgent. Adrenaline spikes like acid on her tongue, pricking and boiling and lashing.

She doesn't know why her first action is to grasp her diary.

 _Tom, something's happened!_

Ginerva, what's wrong? Aren't you supposed to be at the Halloween feast? You haven't stopped talking about it all week.

 _Listen to me. Something is wrong. I blacked out again._

 _There's blood, Tom, she scribbles discordantly. So_ much _blood._

Blood? Where? Are you injured?

 _No, nothing like that...God, Tom._

 _It isn't my blood..._

Ginerva, what did you do?

 _I don't know! I can't remember._

 _I think I hurt someone._

This is worse than I feared, Tom expresses worriedly. Your blackouts are becoming dangerous, to yourself and to others.

 _I should tell someone, a teacher. Visit Madame Promfrey?_

I absolutely forbid it. You can't tell a soul. They'll strap you up and send you to the nearest mental institution.

 _Tom, what if I killed_ —

Don't go there. Get yourself into a shower immediately and get cleaned up. Tell no one.

Ginny does as she's told.

Shakes and convulses as the white floor tile is spattered with red, swirls pink and tangy down the drain.

She scrubs and tears and rakes over her skin until she's rubbed raw and her skin is a raised sort of pink and her scalp is sore.

Hands placed on the shower wall, she sinks into a heap under the faucet, shivering furiously despite the ferocious temperature of the water beating against her skin.

She pulls at her hair.

Screams in hysteria.

* * *

 _End of Part II_


	3. III

**_I Defy You, Stars_**

* * *

 **Disclaimer:** I own absolutely nothing from the Harry Potter universe. This fanfiction is written purely for entertainment purposes and nothing more, though all ideas and writing are done by me and belong to me.

 **A/N:** Crack, that's all this is. Just, utter crack...

Enjoy!

—Annie

* * *

 _Part III_

* * *

 **Obey, and go with me; for thou must die.**

 **I must indeed; and therefore came I hither.**

 **Good gentle youth, tempt not a desperate man;**

 **Fly hence, and leave me: think upon these gone;**

 **Let them affright thee.**

 **I beseech thee, youth, Put not another sin upon my head,**

 **By urging me to fury: O, be gone!**

 **—William Shakespeare**

* * *

 _These violent passions can have violent ends_

* * *

Mrs. Norris is found hanging by her tail on the first floor landing, petrified.

There's a message written in the blood caked to the wall, blood like she'd had on her palms.

THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS HAS BEEN OPENED.

ENEMIES OF THE HEIR, BEWARE.

Did she do this?

Is she responsible?

The school is in a panic, even the teachers are frightened.

They've seen this before.

Percy finds Ginny huddled in a corner in the common room later that night, crying her eyes out like some hysterical madwoman.

"Shh, now, Ron's not going to get expelled. I'm sure they didn't touch the cat. Shh, now."

The rest of the first years are in a tizzy.

But none of them feel the way she does.

Because—

Where did the blood _come_ from?

* * *

 _Now, by the stock and honour of my kin, To strike him dead, I hold it not a sin._

* * *

I've grown stronger. My plan is working.

Ginny traces her fingers along the ridges of his words.

 _Will you tell me your plan?_

Not yet, my dear, but soon.

She sighs, rubs at her face.

Are you quite all right? You seem distant, different.

 _Just tired, Tom. It's been a long couple of days._

I shall let you rest, then.

It's the first time that Ginny does not protest, watches as his elegant script fades into the page and disappears from sight.

She closes the diary shut and places it in her bedside drawer.

Thinks of what might happen if she never opens it again.

* * *

 _Gallop apace, you fiery-footed steeds_

* * *

The next Saturday, Harry is hospitalized due to a rogue bludger and a nasty spell from Lockhart that removes the bones in his arm.

Ginny paces.

She's restless that night, can't stop fidgeting.

She wakes up early the next morning, sprawled out and drooling in a broom cupboard on the fifth floor.

At breakfast, she overhears that Colin Creevey has been petrified. Ginny takes the news especially hard. Colin sits next to her in Charms—he's quirky and sometimes annoying but they get along well and help each other on homework assignments.

She admits to Percy in lieu of a breakdown that she's been having nightmares, trouble sleeping. He discusses writing their mother with Fred and George.

Nothing her mother tells her helps.

* * *

 _O, swear not by the moon, the fickle moon, the inconstant moon_

* * *

You've been avoiding me.

Ginny's hands quake.

 _Not avoiding you. Just focused on other things._

Your affections are waning.

 _Never, Tom, I swear. A friend of mine was recently petrified. I blacked out the night he was placed in the hospital wing._

You don't think you are responsible, do you? Petrification is extremely advanced Dark Magic.

Ginny sniffs, glances behind her back _._

 _I don't know what I'm capable of anymore, Tom. I'm a bad person._

Hush now. I've a present for you, but only if you promise to be a good girl.

Ginny bites her lip.

 _I swear._

Meet with me again at midnight this evening. Do all that I say and you shall get your reward.

Ginny's quill trembles above the page, hesitates. A plop of ink drips onto the parchment, sinks, disappears.

Good girl, Ginerva.

* * *

 _I never saw true beauty till this night_

* * *

Midnight chimes.

Ginny opens the diary.

I've been waiting for you.

 _What are you up to, Tom?_

I'm finally strong enough to see you. Would you like to meet me, Ginerva?

Ginny's heart picks up pace, heavy and chaotic.

 _Yes, please. How?_

Hold on to the diary very tightly and close your eyes.

She does as she's told.

There's a tingling sensation over her fingernails, a tearing sound, a scorching heat, a spine-tingling wind.

Gravity buckles around her and she falls down the rabbit hole.

Almost too late, she realizes she's made a grave mistake.

"Open your eyes, sweet girl."

Tom Riddle is cripplingly beautiful in a way that makes her teeth ache and her spine contract—milky white skin, almost translucent in the dim shrouds of the library's candelabras, bracingly stormy pitch black eyes in a fringe of curled, long lashes.

He is jagged points and sharp angles with high cheekbones and a tense jaw and delicate scarlet lips, like what she might picture a vampire to have.

His hair is a dark cloud of black waves, his smile gleaming and sharp and dazzling—

"Tom," she breathes.

" _Ginerva_ ," he echoes.

And his voice—his _voice_ —it sparks something dangerous and foreign and _frightening_ in her small framed body.

"Where are we?" she questions with curiosity. "It looks like the Hogwarts library."

"It is," he responds quietly, circling her like a vulture tracks it's meal. "This is where I am trapped, forever frozen."

"That must get very lonely," Ginny whispers.

"Oh, it does," Tom recites, eyes heavy and pointed on her form. " _Very_ lonely."

His voice drips down the back of her neck, settles in the notches of her spine. His hands caress the cover of his journal, an exact replica of the one Ginny owns in her own reality.

"Until you."

A chill rolls up from her toes, brushes over her lips.

"You are younger than I assumed you would be," Tom observes calculatingly.

"I'm not _that_ young," Ginny insists defiantly.

"Touched a nerve?"

His answering smirk is both wicked and angelic.

"I'm not just a little girl," she points out stubbornly.

And in that moment she wants him to believe that, desires it more than anything in her system.

Because she doesn't _feel_ young, not anymore, not with him.

With him she's anyone she wants to be, she's any age she chooses to be.

* * *

 _O trespass sweetly urged! Give me my sin again_

* * *

She spends the entire night in Tom's memory, in his alternate reality.

She asks him questions and receives clipped, evasive answers that don't necessarily answer much. She's aware of how suspicious this is, files it into the back of her mind, and presses onward.

Because he's just so captivatingly beautiful and he's fascinated with her, struck by her, impressed by her wit and humor—he _tells her so._

And in return she discloses everything about herself, until he knows her inside out.

Until they are practically one.

Every single meeting with Tom she feels exhilarated in his presence, like she's on top of the world, like she can be anything, _do_ whatever she pleases. She's manic, exuberant, energetic.

With him she feels powerful and beautiful and _wanted._

Her mother and father take off to Egypt to visit her brother Bill over Christmas, leaving Ginny, Ron, the twins, and Percy behind. Even Hermione remains at Hogwarts with Harry, spends all her time with him.

It makes Ginny's blood tick and spiral and coil like an angry snake.

She's been increasingly more irritable since her first encounter with Tom, and it doesn't make _sense_. She flies into fits of blackened rage, delves into pits of deep depression. It's like she's got this voice in the back of her head constantly whispering dark thoughts into her ear.

Telling her to rip open her flesh, she doesn't need the blood, _he does_.

Coaxing her to press the ingredient chopping dagger she's managed to sneak away from Potions just a little deeper into her thigh.

No one will miss you, the black voice promises as she bleeds, smoking and clouding her brain. Stay with me forever. I'm the only one you'll need.

She wakes up with her wand pointed at her chest, as if she's about to blow herself to pieces, chop her flesh into tiny little bits.

It is like he saps her dry after each meeting—she returns to her bed and sleeps in late, misses her morning classes, misses breakfast.

Over winter break, she sometimes sleeps so late that she misses dinner.

And no one notices her absence.

* * *

 _End of Part III_


	4. IV

**_I Defy You, Stars_**

* * *

 **Disclaimer:** I own absolutely nothing from the Harry Potter universe. This fanfiction is written purely for entertainment purposes and nothing more, though all ideas and writing are done by me and belong to me.

 **A/N:** I'm going to get real here, this next chapter is a bit darker than the rest. It's the breaking point in Ginny Weasley and the final steps in Voldemort's plan to be brought to life. He's drawn on her energy, feasted on her fear and her anger and her desire - basically implanted a piece of himself inside of her.

Note: the touching that happens in this chapter is done purely for Voldemort to draw more powerful and manipulate Ginny's fragile state.

Please review at the end and tell me what you thought! Also, stay tuned for the next installment in this story about the aftermath of the diary and the effect it has on Ginny's life from that point forward.

Enjoy!

—Annie

* * *

 _Part IV_

* * *

 **What's here? a cup, closed in my true love's hand?**

 **Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end:**

 **O churl! drunk all, and left no friendly drop To help me after?**

 **I will kiss thy lips; Haply some poison yet doth hang on them,**

 **To make die with a restorative.**

 **Thy lips are warm. Yea, noise? then I'll be brief.**

 **O happy dagger! This is thy sheath; there rust, and let me die**

 **—William Shakespeare**

* * *

 _Go, get thee hence, for I will not away_

* * *

Justin and Nearly Headless Nick fall victim to another attack, petrified.

Ginny confides her fear in the diary, wrings her hands until they feel like breaking.

Tom grows more persistent, urges to meet with her in person more, and Ginny gladly obliges.

She is drunk on his toxins, drugged by his chilling whisper on her neck, high on the effect he has on Ginny's developing body. She isn't sheltered, she isn't _stupid_. She's overheard her brothers conversations about sex, read the articles in the older girls' _Witch Weekly_ copies, inspected and _felt_ her body.

She's aware of herself as a growing woman in a way that no eleven year old girl should be and Tom Riddle is responsible for it.

* * *

 _Oh happy dagger, this is thy sheath; there rust, and let me die_

* * *

One brisk wintry evening, everything changes.

"I wonder if I can—sometimes I _wonder_ —" he trails off.

The library torches throw shadows on his handsome face.

"What is it, Tom?" she inquires.

"Sometimes, I wonder what it might be like if I could touch you."

His words tingle down her spine, clip her heart into pretty little ribbons.

"I do, too," she whispers shyly, glancing down at her trembling hands. "Sometimes I dream about you."

"Do you?" he hisses, gliding over to her. She's caught in his predatory gaze. "And in these dreams of yours, what do I do to you, Ginerva?"

She flushes, shakes her head.

"Don't play coy now, princess," he whispers. " _Tell me_."

"I—I can't—"

"May I try?" Tom inquires, stretching out his slim, spidery fingers toward her hand.

She nods, can't understand why. But she wants this. She's _curious._

She's sick inside.

She's blackness.

They both let out a hollow sigh when their skin connects—Tom's is more of a hiss, Ginny's is more a gasp. It's electricity and pain and pleasure and _intensity_ like she's never experienced.

She can practically _feel_ the Dark Magic charging through his skin and into hers.

A feral smile curls up his crimson lips. He licks them.

"Oh, Ginerva, can you feel that?" he hums, clutching her wrists urgently. "The power between us? Feel how it cackles around us like static?"

His fingers slide up her forearm.

"What you do to me," he murmurs into her hair.

She swallows hard. She feels suddenly weak.

"Tell me, sweet girl, in your dreams of me, where do I touch you?"

His fingers lock painfully on her arm, cutting off the flow.

Is he getting stronger?

" _Show me_."

With a shaking hand, she motions to her lips. His thumb parts her mouth, pinches her bottom lip until it bleeds. She begins to shake violently.

"N—No."

" _Shh_ _._ Tell me, Ginerva, do I kiss you?"

Her eyes slap closed as his lips lock roughly to hers, sensual and demanding. And she wants to give in, wants to run, doesn't expect it to feel this way.

It isn't like her dream, no, she's encased in a nightmare.

"Where else do I touch you?" he breathes hotly in her ear. When she doesn't immediately answer, he nicks her ear with his teeth, draws blood.

Trembling, she points to her neck. His fingers latch onto her, his fingernails dig into the skin at the base of her neck. His tongue darts out to taste the sensitive flesh of her pulse point.

"Anywhere else?" he hisses along her collarbone.

Frightened beyond measure, trying to keep hold of her wits, she shakes her head, puckers her lips, eyes the ceiling.

"You can't _lie_ to me Ginerva," he snarls blackly, picks up her cold hands. " _Lead_ me."

"No."

" _Do it_!" he shouts, his eyes burn red like fire, and she whimpers.

Her hands shake as she traces his hands up her thigh, over her stomach, to the mounds of her breasts. He kneads them and she breaks.

She cries hot, salty tears.

"Good girl, Ginerva," he whispers darkly against her chest. "Such a _good_ girl."

* * *

 _Play'd for a pair of stainless maidenhoods_

* * *

She sleeps for a solid twenty four hours.

Wakes to the image of Tom Riddle on top of her, his sharp teeth bared and his crimson lips rolled back, his spidery hands locked like tight fetters around her neck, scarlet eyes gleaming in the throw of candle light.

She tries to scream, chokes on blood, bites back a gasp.

Scrambles from bed.

Washes in a too-hot shower.

She screams at the sudden cramping in her abdomen, at the blood between her legs, and on her hand.

Watches as it spirals down the drain, and her memory flashes black and white, gray and red.

Is she dying?

Did she black out again?

Who did she kill this time?

Her cries wake half the dormitory.

It's Hermione that switches off the faucet, kneels in the bloody puddle at her feet, draws Ginny close to her chest.

"Sweetie, it's okay," she comforts the hysterical redhead. "It's just your period."

* * *

 _What devil art thou, that dost torment me thus?_

* * *

When February arrives, Ginny has abandoned the diary in her bedside table. She successfully ignores the hum of its call to her at night and the way her hands ache to stroke it.

It angers him.

Invokes hatred in him.

She knows because she can _hear_ him now, all around her.

He visits in her dreams, always to kill her, to touch her.

And still she remains strong, does not open the diary.

He begins to torture her.

Professor Flitwick's easy smile is suddenly rampant with sharp teeth and miniature snakes that slip out of his cackling throat and drip onto the floor, wrap around her legs and her hands.

She's pretty certain in Potions that Snape transforms wholly into a bloodthirsty vampire, that he lingers just a second too long behind her as he inspects her potion. Blood drips from his teeth onto her shoulder.

She becomes so paranoid that she runs the entire way back to the Gryffindor tower after dinner each night, convinced some type of blood-faced spider woman with black hair and eight limbs is hunting her down, crawling on the walls and the ceilings.

The faces on the posters in her dormitory shriek and laugh maniacally at her, bare fangs and claws and reach for her until she screams.

The portraits in the corridors have black eyes and whisper to her.

I know what you did, they say to her. Murderer. Dark witch. Whore.

No one reacts. No one stirs.

How can they not _see_ it?

The diary continues to beckon.

Sweet girl, sweet girl, sweet girl.

She tries to rip the pages from the seam, cries out in horrified frustration when they mend themselves and reattach before her very eyes.

She tries burning it in the fire. Not once does it catch flame.

The diary beckons, screams and berates her.

Tom Riddle invades her dreams, steals her innocence through her mind.

Once he mesmerized her, now he terrifies her.

Gone is her devoted friend. In his place rests a raging psychopath, hellbent on destroying every fiber in her soul.

She finally can't stand it a second longer.

Chucks it where she's certain it will never be found—the abandoned girls lavatory.

Unbeknownst to her, it soars straight through a dead girl's face and lands in a puddle of rusty water in a far stall.

When she discovers that Harry Potter has become its new owner, Ginny screams into her pillow, bites her lip until it bleeds.

Because, like hell she's going to let Tom Riddle destroy Harry Potter, too.

* * *

 _Thus with a kiss, I die_

* * *

Hermione Granger is found petrified in the library and the school releases a curfew. Every night a six o'clock, she's shut in with no place to wander with all the other Gryffindors.

When Dumbledore is removed from Hogwarts and Hagrid is thrown into Azkaban, Ginny shakes and cries and loses control.

She's black with a rage she didn't know she had.

It spirals and breaks around her like a cloud of smoke.

She's pretty sure when she screams, the vase of wilting Valentine flowers Lavender Brown had received shatters into a million tiny fragments.

But she can't be sure.

She doesn't know what is real anymore.

She corners Harry and Ron at breakfast.

"I have to tell you something," she starts, panicked.

When Percy grazes her arm to take the seat she'd abandoned, Ginny twitches, startles.

Because for one moment, she thinks that Percy is Tom.

She runs and run and runs until she can no longer draw breath.

* * *

 _There will be no sign of life within you_

* * *

Ginny tears apart the boy's dormitory, rips it to shreds.

She successfully steals back the diary.

It hums in her embrace.

I knew you'd return to me, my sweet, loyal Ginerva.

She roils with sickness.

 _Leave Harry Potter alone._

She can almost _feel_ the diary mocking her.

If I have you, I have no need for him.

 _I'll figure out a way to destroy you,_ she vows.

You forget the power you've given me, child. I'll live inside of you forever.

 _I gave you nothing._

Foolish, silly little girl, Tom slices and Ginny flares, feels her soul blacken. Did you really think you could escape me? I had you wrapped around my finger.

 _What are you talking about?_

You _needed_ me, little one. You craved my power, basked in it. You enjoyed the darkness and now you always will. You'll feel empty without it. Without _me_.

 _I hate you!_

Good! Let me feel that anger, that betrayal, the bitterness. It feeds me more than your silly pining ever did. And now that we've touched, now that I've marked your soul, your body, entrapped your mind—now you are forever mine.

 _I do not belong to you!_

How do you explain your blackouts, Ginerva? How can you explain leaving your body and using your own two hands to snap a rooster's neck, to sever it and dip your fingers in its blood. It was you, sweet girl, that wrote the message on the wall. It was you that kept killing Hagrid's roosters. You see, a rooster's cry can kill a basilisk and I can't very well petrify and kill all the muggleborns in this school if my basilisk is dead.

Ginny gasps, covers her mouth, feels dread pool in her abdomen.

I have controlled you and you've gladly done my bidding. You promised you would do anything for me. Now, you will do one last thing for me.

 _I'll never do your bidding. NEVER._

Stupid girl! LOOK AT YOURSELF. Look at what I have done to you.

And for the first time in months, Ginny chances a look in the mirror. Gone is her precious baby face, replaced by a hollow ashen burrow of sinking flesh and bruised eyelids and brittle bone structure. Blackish purple welts lie discreetly across her throat, covered by a scarf she wasn't even sure she'd put on.

She's haunted. Corpse-like.

You gave me permission to touch your body, Ginerva. You welcomed my entrance into your soul. It is mine now. And you will bring Harry Potter to me tonight and you will die so that I may return to power, so that I may kill your precious hero.

Ginny flinches at her reflection, watches in chaos as her eyes shift from blue to pitch black to scarlet.

And then she remembers no more.

* * *

 _Never was there a story of more woe than this_

* * *

Ginny wakes in Harry's arms, somewhere mucky and slimy and _freezing_.

"I did it—I—I did it—"

Harry hushes her and she continues to prattle, anxiety flaring.

"It's over," Harry soothes.

The diary, _Tom's_ diary, lies mangled and bleeding black blood, a large basilisk tooth lodged deep into the heart of it.

Ginny knows he's dead, but only just. She still feels his fingers around her throat, feels his lips on her neck.

She doesn't remember exactly how she finds herself in front of McGonagall's office with Harry, Ron, Lockhart, and Dumbledore's phoenix.

She stiffens when her mother screams her name, tears flowing down her terrified face. Molly and Arthur Weasley fling their arms around their daughter, brush back her hair, sob into her shoulder.

Ginny is numb.

She doesn't cry.

 _Can't_ cry.

Not even when she discovers that Tom Riddle is— _was_ —Lord Voldemort.

He'd been possessing her, entrapping her, enchanting her.

She had befriended, trusted, _loved_ Lord Voldemort.

She's struck like a bitchslap when her father begins to scold her.

Why did she trust the diary? Hadn't they taught her anything?

 _Never trust anything that can think for itself if you can see where it keeps its brain._

Dark Magic, clearly.

Stupid, foolish little girl.

She is ushered to the hospital wing.

"She's in shock," they explain.

Ginny returns home shortly after, but nothing is the same.

Her pink walls and porcelain dolls and frilly lace white curtains are that of a little girl, a little girl that died and was left behind in that chamber.

She died when Tom Riddle did, left behind in the dust and grime.

She still has nightmares from time to time, though they are mostly gone, and when they invade her brain in the black of night, Ginny shrieks as if she's been stabbed.

The first few nights back home, her father finds her huddled in the corner, hands over her eyes, rocking back and forth as if she's gone mad.

The healers claim she's a perfectly healthy young woman, nothing wrong with her.

But they are wrong, so very, _very_ wrong.

Because they don't see the blackness that remains on her soul, they don't see the gleaming white teeth shrouded in crimson that gleam at her from the darkness of her closet, or the shadows that follow her down the stairs, or the _voice_ inside her head.

Sweet girl, Ginerva. Good girl. Lovely, pretty, _strong_ , Ginerva.

 _My_ Ginerva.

 _Always yours, Tom. You promised me so._

* * *

 _End of I Defy You, Stars_

* * *

 _Please review your thoughts below! Stay tuned and look for the sequel to this. Much love xoxo -Annie_


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